Harworth appoints LSH to manage business park in Lancashire

Harworth Group plc has instructed Lambert Smith Hampton to provide property and facilities management services for Walton Summit Business Park in Preston, Lancashire as it continues to grow its income portfolio.

The business park, which encompasses a total of 428,880 sq ft, was recently acquired by Harworth for £13.425m to strengthen its income portfolio. LSH’s subsequent instruction includes property management, facilities management, service charge administration and tenant liaison.

Walton Summit Business Park incorporates Four Oaks Business Park (294,100 sq ft) which contains four warehouse units ranging in size from 9,884 sq ft to 121,710 sq ft. The other part of the site is a single warehouse unit of 134,780 sq. ft known as ‘Alpha’.

The site is among seven that LSH has recently mobilized for Harworth, whereby new accounts and facilities management processes must be set up and implemented within a narrow timescale.

Katy Brindley, Client Manager for Harworth at LSH said: “Mobilising such a large site is an incredibly exciting, albeit high pressure process. As we have a strong track record in successful site mobilisation, were we brought in to begin the process before our client had acquired the site. This enabled us to undertake pre-acquisition due diligence in relation to the service charge, and inspect the premises, speeding up the mobilisation process significantly and thereby meaning we were ready to go live on day one.”

LSH now manages nineteen sites for Harworth providing a range of services, from contractor management and health and safety inspection, to tenant liaison and rent and service charges.

Harworth Group plc has become one of the largest property and regeneration companies across the North of England and the Midlands, owning and managing over 22,000 acres across 150 sites. Key developments include the Advanced Manufacturing Park in Rotherham, Logistics North in Bolton, the Sherburn Rail Freight Terminal in North Yorkshire, Gateway 36 in Barnsley and Melton Commercial Park in Leicestershire.

Liz Askam, Business Space Manager at Harworth Group plc, said: “The past few years have been very successful for Harworth and LSH has played an important role in ensuring that our commercial sites run smoothly. We look forward to maintaining this success as we continue to grow and diversify our income portfolio.”